This post was created in partnership with Codeword
Modern culture moves faster than any marketing calendar can keep up with—which means the brands that win aren’t the ones planning the farthest ahead, but the ones building systems nimble enough to move with the moment. Today, speed isn’t a tactic; it’s an operating model.
During an ADWEEK House Raceway fireside chat co-hosted with Codeword, the intersection of speed and culture took center stage. In conversation with Ryan Joe, editor-in-chief at ADWEEK, Kyle Monson, founding partner of Codeword, and Jessica Williams, head of brand marketing and partnerships at Shopify, explored how successful marketers are ditching the traditional calendar to build systems that move as fast as the world around them
Time for less trend-chasing
For decades, marketers chased one version of pop culture. Monson said that era is over.
“We’re living in an age where there are 1,000 pop culture flowers blooming,” Monson stated. “But you know, more people have not seen a Mr. Beast video than have seen a Mr. Beast video.”
This fragmentation isn’t a problem—it’s an opportunity to specialize. Monson noted that while sports like F1 are having a moment, they remain niche relative to the general population. “Most people do not care about F1 at all, which is great for brands, because we can be really strategic around picking and choosing.”
For Shopify, navigating this landscape means focusing less on chasing every trend and more on empowering the specific communities that align with their core mission. “The niche communities that live and breathe on Shopify have plenty of cultural moments,” Williams shared.
“They breathe the cultural moments. They make the cultural moments. And so the more that we can enable them to do those things better. That’s where we really live and play,” she said.
Agility comes from insiders
Authenticity is the fuel of modern marketing, and if you want to enter a passionate niche, you need team members who are already insiders—not generalists.
“One thing that Codeword does is we try and hire from the communities we’re trying to reach,” Monson shared. “Android’s a client of ours. I want Android fanboys on my team, because if you’re not an Android fanboy, you are not gonna be able to speak to that community. They will sniff you out in a second and know that you’re faking it.”
He applied this same logic to Formula 1 partnerships. “I need an F1 fan to be driving that creative and strategy forward, because they just speak the language.”
Williams echoed this sentiment, sharing that her team thrives because they’re “perpetually online,” always learning new communities and ideas. They listen to creators who know their audiences best—and it shows.
She described a New York pop-up with creator MyFam, who built a meticulous bonsai-themed space that drew lines around the block. For her team, these projects are a chance to explore new worlds and keep Shopify’s creative work fresh and unexpected.
Shifting to a daily media model over a seasonal campaign
The biggest shift happening is the move away from long-tail campaigns toward a high-velocity “shipping” mentality. In a world of fleeting attention spans, trying to sustain a single moment for months is a waste of resources.
“Honestly, we don’t try to make campaigns last that long—the moment is the moment,” Williams admitted regarding celebrity partnerships. “It’s the consistency and the reps for Shopify that matter most.”
Monson agreed, comparing the new necessary workflow to a newsroom rather than a traditional ad agency. “It’s much more like a media model where you’re shipping something today, and you’re going to ship another thing tomorrow, and you’re going to ship another thing next Monday,” Monson said. “It actually doesn’t have to last that long. You just have to capture the enthusiasm in that one moment.”
That speed requires trust—and a willingness to embrace imperfection. Following a pop-up event with Nicki Minaj, a typo on social media could have been a PR nightmare. Instead, it became a win for brand recall.
“When Nicki posted about it, she called us Spotify instead of Shopify,” Williams recounted.
Now, while traditional instincts might scream “crisis,” Williams shared that the community reaction was immediate and engaged on the post, with numerous people responding: “I think you mean Shopify.” “That was enough for us to say, ‘best partnership we’ve ever had,’ because no one’s going to forget who we are after that,” said Williams.